IR // News // VA embezzler ordered to repay $46,000

IR // News // VA embezzler ordered to repay $46,000: "Gard was a Veterans Administration employee at Fort Harrison, and also did contract work, providing medical transcription typing services. She overstated her line counts on fraudulent invoices submitted to the VA between Sept. 2001 and November 2003, causing her to be overpaid by $46,356. "

Medical Transcription - starting a business on a budget

Starting Your Home Based Business on a Shoestring Budget
Copyright © Stone Evans, The Home Biz Guy
http://www.PlugInProfitSite.com/main-6169

Whether seeking a supplemental income or a full-time income,
many folks have undertaken the task to discover a viable home
based business solution to meet their personal needs.

For most folks who contemplate a home business, a low-cost or
no-cost solution is not only nice, but also very necessary. Many
also seek to find a home business that will permit them to
maintain their regular day job in order to protect their base
income.

Taking the cautious approach to a home based business and
keeping one's job during the start-up period is often a very
good decision. By maintaining one's job, one can maintain the
health of their personal finances while permitting their home
business grow healthy and strong.

Fortunately, most home based businesses can be started with
little or no cash, can be maintained on a shoestring budget, and
can be operated successfully with only a part-time investment.

One day, the business will be strong enough to support itself
and its owner. When that time comes, it will make good sense for
the business owner to leave his or her outside job to dedicate
more time to growing and maintaining their new thriving home
based business. You will know when that time has finally arrived.

The nature of a home based business makes it easy and very
realistic for most folks to take the plunge into home business
ownership.

Yet, many folks put off starting their own home based business,
because they have the misconception that they will have to risk
thousands of their own hard-earned dollars at start-up. Then
later, if their business fails, they fear they may be forced to
take out a second mortgage on their house just to stay out of
bankruptcy.

Are you one of these folks? Do you let your fears of failure
keep you from reaching for your dreams?

If so, then allow me to introduce you to a few home business
ideas that you can start for less than $100 and can be started
and operated very profitably as a part-time business.


THE LIFEBLOOD OF ALL SUCCESSFUL BUSINESSES

First of all, let me advise you to search out a business model
that will deliver steady and repeat business. It is the one
thing --- above all others --- that will assure that your
company can survive the test of time.


HOME-BASED MAIL ORDER:
Home-based mail order is a good example of how one can quickly
grow a home business income. Mail order is a low cost start-up
business that can be launched for around $100 USD.

With proper planning, your home-based mail order business will
not require up-front inventory purchases. In the mail order
business, it is not uncommon to rely upon drop-shippers for
product fulfillment services.

By utilizing drop-shippers, we can sell the products, collect
the money and then purchase the products from the wholesale
outlet. The wholesale outlet will then put a return address for
your company on the product packaging and deliver the product
directly to your customer.

By using the following link, you can explore the drop-ship
directory, which will let you explore the drop-shipping
companies that will enable you sell 500,000 products from over
1,000 brand name manufacturers:

http://www.home-business.com/dropship.html

Your primary expense in the mail-order business is advertising.
Classified advertising tends to be a relatively inexpensive form
of advertising with thousands of outlets available to the small
business owner.


WHOLESALE BUSINESS:
Buy low --- sell high. You can acquire high quality,
top-of-the-line merchandise for a fraction of the retail cost.
Starting a wholesale business would require a Wholesale Dealers
Directory as your source for merchandise, such as the one above
or the one listed here:

http://www.home-business.com/auction.html


AUCTIONS:
Auctions can be an excellent source for buying cheap and selling
high. Both government auctions and Internet auctions can lead to
some excellent profit opportunities. Auctions are an excellent
tool for both acquiring and selling merchandise.


MAKE AND SELL YOUR CRAFTS:
Crafts are a hot seller at country fairs, swap meets or anyplace
where people gather. Make your own crafts and sell them for a
tidy profit!


SELLING INFORMATION:
Selling information by mail is another good example of an
inexpensive home based business start-up. One can gain the
resale rights to information for usually about $50 USD. Other
costs will include printer cartridges, paper and postage. There
are plenty of free classifieds sites on the Internet, in which
to successfully advertise your information.


WRITE INFORMATIONAL BOOKLETS:
Write and publish your own informational booklets; sell them at
a high price! All you need is a little know-how, a printer,
paper and stamps. This is a GREAT home business idea! You can
also sell the resale rights to others, for extra profits. In
this age of the Internet, you may also take advantage of the
fact that selling information is one of the most profitable
endeavors one can pursue online.


OFFICE SERVICES:
Offer office services for hire in your local paper. You'll be
surprised at the amount of regular office business that can be
gleaned from one little classified ad. Word processing, typing,
accounting, data entry, proofreading, transcription, promotional
letters and newsletters. All these tasks can be accomplished
right from your own home office.


AVON REPRESENTATIVE:
Yes, Avon's been around for eternity, hasn't it? Then it's not
such a bad prospect as a home based business, is it? I once knew
a woman who did so much business as an Avon rep. that she had
people calling her and knocking at her door wanting to order
products at all hours of the day and night! Once you are an
established Avon representative, you, too, will turn a good
profit.


CONCLUSION:
On your search for the ideal home based business, try not to get
caught up in any scams that will run off with your money. There
are thousands of scam artists out there just waiting for the
next sucker to come along. Remember, if it sounds too good to be
true, then it probably is. Just use your good judgement and
invest wisely in proven methods of earning extra income.

Stone Evans Will Personally Build A Money Making Website
Just For You That's 100% Ready To Take Orders And Pull In
Massive Residual Profits. Get Details And Signup Today At:
http://www.PlugInProfitSite.com/main-6169

Medical Transcription - marketing with signs

Sign On Your Car

As our cities sprawl with growth each year, many of us find ourselves commuting ever longer distances to work. Long commutes in slow traffic are making signs on automobiles an effective low-cost way to advertise.

You can use magnetic signs, window stickers, or have yourmessage painted on the side of your car, van, or tuck. Check the Yellow Pages for a printer, sign company, or banner maker who can provide your signs.

Online check:
http://www.signsquick.com
http://www.goldsword.com/signtech/samples.html

Because we tend to drive along with the same clump of cars for significant distances, people can see your sign for 15 to20 minutes. Your signs can work as a prolonged highway infomercial.

An old media trick is to number your vehicles. One station had two vans: number 3 and number 7. People thought they had a whole fleet.

Kevin Nunley provides marketing and copy writing. Read all his free tips at http://DrNunley.com Reach Kevin at kevin@drnunley.com or 603-249-9519.

Medical Transcription - Business Resources

Government Resources

There is a wealth of information available on the Internet about starting and operating a business from home. In addition to web sites, these organizations have local branches that can tell you what licenses and permits you need in your town. Here are some useful web sites.

Small Business Administration
http://www.sba.gov
800-827-5722

The SBA's Online Women's Business Center
http://www.onlinewbc.org

Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE)
http://www.score.org
800-827-5722

Medical Transcription - 6 Amazing Secrets

6 Amazing Secrets To Work At Home Success
By Vernette Carbon

Are you a stay at home mom or dad who would like to work from home? Maybe you have a job outside the home, but you're tired of juggling your job and your kids, especially when your child is sick and needs you.

You'd like to work from home, but it seems as though there are no legitimate jobs out there. You don't really want to start a home-based business from scratch, but would love to work from home.

Well let me tell you a little secret, knowledge is power. And there are 15 strategies you must apply if you want to be successful in landing a work at home job or contract These 15 strategies will definitely help you beat out your competition.

Let me share with you 6 of the 15 strategies I've used and continue to use to increase my chances of obtaining home-based jobs and contracts over and over again.

1. You Must Acquire A Specialized Skill The secret to landing a home-based job or independent contract and keeping it forever is to acquire a specialized skill, or start a career in a field that is completely recession proof and in high demand but has a low supply of skilled workers.

For instance, people will always get sick. So therefore doctors will always need Medical transcriptionists. Another example; companies will always have quarterly meetings and will always need general transcriptionists to transcribe reports, minutes, etc.

If you lose your home-based job today, you can apply for another one tomorrow and land another job within a week or two. How am I so sure about this? Well I've done it over and over again as a general transcriptionist, and Cyber Agent (Call Center Customer Service Rep) for the past five and a half years. The jobs and independent contracts in these fields are in abundance.

As an example, let's look at Medical Transcriptionist. Just go to your search engine and type in the keywords, "Medical Transcription Companies." You will see hundreds of medical transcription companies listed. Just visit a few of the web sites and check to see if there's an "employment," "Career," "Join us," "Contact," etc., tab on the web site. I'm sure you'll find several job openings.

2. Don't work at home for the wrong reasons.

Too many people want to work at home for the wrong reasons. Never tell an employer that you want to work at home because you need to spend more time with your children. That will certainly seem selfish to an employer, and you would never get hired. Most employers don't care whether you want to stay at home with your children or not. Wanting to work from home to spend more time with your children is not really a wrong reason, but in an employer's mind it is.

Why not look at it this way; working from home would enable you to be more productive in the sense that you would not miss work when your children are sick. Also if some other family issues arise you can take care of it without calling in sick. Wouldn't this be more beneficial to the employer instead of saying you want to work at home to spend more time with the kids?

3. Be Professional At All Times

When applying for a home-based job, never respond to an ad via email stating, "I'm interested in the work-at-home (data entry) position." This is quite unprofessional. Once you find a home-based job vacancy, apply by sending your cover letter and resume, or fill out an online application.

If the employer didn't ask for a cover letter in the job vacancy ad, please send one anyway. Never send a resume without a cover letter. It will get thrown in the trash. Please customize each cover letter with information tailored to that specific job advertisement.

4. Never Send Your Resume As An Attachment Unless The ad States That You Can Do So

The hiring manager might never open the attachment. Also, never copy and paste your resume into the body of your email and send it to an employer. It will change format by the time it reaches to the employer, and will look like a jumbled mess. You must create an ASCII/Plain Text resume and cover letter. For more information on how to do this please visit the following web sites, http://resume.monster.com/dosanddonts/email/Index.asp or http://www.eresumeiq.com/ABC.html.

5. Follow Instructions

When responding to a job vacancy announcement please make sure you follow the ad instructions. If the ad asks for specific information please do exactly as it says. For instance, if the ad says, please describe home office equipment, make sure you mention in your cover letter exactly what equipment you have in your home office.

I was once commended by an employer for being the only job applicant, out of

hundreds to actually follow the specific instructions in the job ad. I was hired for this home-based job mainly because I followed instructions, not because I was more qualified than all the other applicants.

6. Reduce Your Job Search Time Finding a job using the Internet can be a frustrating, time-consuming endeavor because there are literally 1000's of job boards and work at home resources. And don't forget the Job newsgroups and the regional newspapers.

To be current on this information is essential. Let YourJobSearcher do the work for you. This software is not only for 9-5 job searches. You can use it to find telecommuting jobs also. All you have to do is download and install your Job Search Program, enter your job description (home-based job title you desire), click and begin the search. It's that easy.

Vernette Carbon is the owner-publisher of AmazingWorkatHomeSecrets.com, and a work at home mom with two children. Discover how you can work at home for Fortune- 500 companies like Office Depot, Sears, etc. To obtain a free report sent to your email immediately visit: http://www.AmazingWorkathomeSecrets.com/intro_new.html or send a blank email to mailto:carbonv@getresponse.com

Medical Transcription - Start an At-Home Career

Start a Medical Transcription At Home Career!
By Michele Miller

As a medical transcriptionist, I do get asked several times a month, how I got started in this business. So many people nowadays want to work from home, especially mothers with young children. That’s the primary reason I started my home business ten years ago, so I could be there for my daughter. I didn’t want someone else taking care of her after school instead of me.

It’s really not hard to start a medical transcription business. The start-up costs are low compared to many other home-based businesses.

You need a form of education, via home study courses or by attending your local community college. You do NOT need a degree in medical transcription to start a business either. In a short amount of time, usually nine months or less, you can be working from the comfort of your own home, just like me.

You will need some equipment, such as a computer, a printer, a transcriber, and some reference books. All of which can be purchased second hand if need be. The latest and greatest equipment is not necessary to get started.

Now, there are some special skills you will need, outside of the education, which include:

* Excellent grammar skills

* Good Listening Skills,

* Basic computer skills with a word processing program

* Research Skills

* Ability to type – your speed will increase with experience

* Must be detail oriented

* Ability to work on your own

* Ability to maintain work deadlines and be a

self-motivator

You will also need some computer programs such as a medical spellchecker and a word expander utility to cut down on the amount of actual typing you do. Some programs, such as Microsoft Word® include this type of utility. It is the best invention by far, in my opinion.

Basic bookkeeping is necessary, but not difficult. A good bookkeeper is great to have when it comes to taxes and advising you about saving money with tax deductions for your business.

Medical transcription is usually paid by the amount of work transcribed. Therefore, it is quite normal to charge your clients by the line. If you charge 13 cents per line and type 200 lines per hour, (this is a very comfortable speed to type) your hourly rate would end up being about $26.00.

Being self-employed does have some pitfalls. One must consider, as with any home based business, that once you become self-employed you are responsible for securing your own health insurance, and putting away money for retirement.

However, there are many positive things about being self-employed, as I’m sure you can imagine. For me, what I love the most, is the flexibility I have with my time. If I want to work late in the day I can, and if I want to work early in the morning, that’s up to me. Running a home-based medical transcription business is a lot of fun.

Medical transcription is not for everyone, and it is important before venturing in to any business that you weigh up the pros and cons of it all and do what is best for your situation.

Michele Miller is a home-based business owner and medical transcriptionist who helps others start their own home based medical transcription companies. You can visit her website: http://www.startasecretarialbusiness.com/medical-transcription.html

Medical Transcription - Planning for Profits

Plan Your Business for Profits
by Leva Duell
Copyright: 2005

Most businesses fail to plan for success. Knowing your customers, and uniqueness are the first steps to developing a successful business. Follow these steps to position your business for profits.

Step 1: Define Your Ideal Customers, Their Needs and Concerns

Many businesses are trying to attract everybody. Don't make this mistake. Your business will be more profitable when focusing on your ideal prospects who are likely to buy your products or services. Ask the following questions to create a profile of your ideal customers.

- Who are your customers?
- Who wants or needs your products or services?
- What is the age range, gender, profession, industry, income level, and education of your ideal customers?
- What are your customers' needs, wants, and concerns?
- What problems can you solve for your customers?
- What is the common denominator of your customers?
- What information do they want?
- Are most of your customers computer literate? Will they look for products or services like yours on the Web?

After defining your ideal customers, target your sales copy, sales materials, web design and web content directly to them.

Tell right away what you offer and what's in it for them. If they don't read further, they were not prospects. Attract your target audience with a benefit-oriented headline and provide valuable, useful, and interesting information your prospects are interested in.

If you are targeting seniors, make your text large. If your prospects are accountants, use a conservative design. Make your design colorful for children. Avoid video and sound on your web site if your clients have slow computers and Internet connections.

Step 2: Demonstrate Your Uniqueness

Emphasize your uniqueness to stand out from your competition. Attract your audience with a benefit that is different from your competitors. What is your distinct advantage? What separates you from your competition? What is distinctive about your offer?

Answer these questions to help you formulate your uniqueness.

- Why should prospects buy from you instead of your competitors?
- What are the most important benefits or results your customers will achieve from your products or services?
- What do you do better than anyone else? Do you possess hard-to-find or specialized expertise?
- Do you offer a free consultation, initial visit, analysis, or better advice?
- What makes your products or services better, unique, or more desirable than your competitors?
- Do you have the lowest prices or the highest quality products in your industry?
- Do you provide the fastest service, the strongest guarantee, longest hours, or better follow up?
- Do you keep customers informed with newsletters or information hotlines?

Determine what makes your business unique. Then emphasize your uniqueness to make your sales materials and web site stand out and set you apart from your competition.

Plan your business for profits. Determine who your ideal audience is and what makes your business unique. Only after implementing these steps are you ready to start developing your sales materials and web content.

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You can reprint this article on your web site if you include this Resource Box:
Looking for typing work at home? Start a secretarial business. The Secretarial-Business-in-a-Box provides instant tools you need to start and run a successful secretarial service. F*ree articles and business start-up newsletter at http://www.startasecretarialbusiness.com.
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Medical Transcription - Tips for Success for Small Businesses

Success Tips for Small Business Owners
By Lorraine Pirihi


Running a small business requires many skills. However, to do this successfully you need to organize yourself first. Avoid procrastination - read the following and take action.

Successful Small Business Owners Look After Themselves First

Exercise regularly, eat healthily and be around positive people. Feed your mind by attending personal development courses. Read self-help and motivational books, listen to tapes. Stress management levels will be much more effective when you look after yourself.

Do the right thing by yourself and you'll have heaps of energy, be motivated, have more balance in your life which in turn will help you be more productive and successful.

Successful Small Business Owners Clean out the Clutter Regularly

You will save yourself heaps of time, energy and money if you clear out your work and home environment…paperwork, books, old equipment etc. You'll be able to find things, save money because you won't have to buy what you already have hidden somewhere, plus you'll be less stressed. Organize your office and your small business premises regularly…keep the clutter out. Eliminating clutter will help you to avoid procrastination. It's too easy to avoid getting things done if you are overwhelmed with clutter.

Successful Small Business Owners Use the Right Tools

It's no good having the latest whiz-bang computer when the desk that you sit at is too small to accommodate it, or the chair has poor back support, or the lighting is dull causing you eyestrain and fatigue. All these factors heavily influence how you work. Invest in a decent desk, purchase a desk lamp or change the light globes.

Don't avoid the warning signs your body gives you. Take action now before you have eye, back or neck problems.

Successful Small Business Owners Use a Diary or Digital organiser

With so much to organize in your small business, you need to record your appointments and things to do and goals somewhere. Preferably in a paper diary or digital organiser that you can take everywhere. This is the most effective way to get things done, plan your work and your life. Balance is extremely important. Top achievers are great at time management (even if they have to pay someone else to organize them).

Successful Small Business Owners Learn to say "No"

To dramatically improve your productivity and do more of the things you want, you have to be firm with others and let them know if you cannot, will not or are unavailable to fulfil their requests. If you constantly say "yes" to everyone else's requests you will never have the time to do what you really want to.

Book yourself into a self-assertiveness course to learn these skills if you feel you need to.

Successful Small Business Owners Do What They Do Best and Delegate the Rest

See what tasks you can delegate tasks which would suit someone else's talents. Many small business owners are spending heaps of time on mundane secretarial tasks which would take a person who is trained in that area a quarter of the time to undertake. Stress management is an important part of running your small business. Reduce the stress by delegating or outsourcing wherever you can.

Use a bookkeeper, personal assistant or virtual assistant. Always ask yourself, who else can I get to do this? Use your time management to focus on what you do best.

Successful Small Business Owners Only Have Meetings if Necessary

Make sure the meetings you organize in your small business are relevant and run effectively. Avoid procrastination - always make sure there is an outcome and all actions are followed through.

The Final Word

By following these simple yet very effective time management tips for small business owners you will have more control over your work and your life. You'll have more balance, experience less stress and be more proactive.

Avoid procrastination…take action today!

About The Author

Lorraine Pirihi is Australia's Personal Productivity Specialist and Leading Life Coach. Her business The Office Organiser specialises in showing small business owners and managers, how to get organised at work so they can have a life! Lorraine is also a dynamic speaker and has produced many products including "How to Survive and Thrive at Work!" To subscribe to her free ezine visit www.office-organiser.com.au

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Medical Transcription - EMR and SOAP Notes

Finding an EMR System that can Handle Medical Transcription SOAP Notes
By Joe Miller

Searching for the Right EMR Solution

The electronic medical record, or EMR, is a standard electronic database solution used by medical practices and medical service providers. The EMR solution technology effectively manages medical histories, records, and notes; however, all EMR solutions are not created equal. Before adopting an EMR solution, medical practices and medical service providers must search for the EMR solution that meets their specific needs. Two important needs common to most medical practices and medical service providers include medical transcription and SOAP note management.

Sifting through EMR Software

The best way to find what you’re looking for is to "begin with the end in mind," as Steven R. Covey says. Companies may have a small staff, or they may still be using a transcription machine. A practice may need more security, more automation, and better control of SOAP notes or other medical transcription information. In order to find what you need, you need to list them out. The list may look similar to this:

Medical Transcription and SOAP Note Management
Document Scanning Attachments
Customized Data Fields
Medicare or Medicaid Billing Software
Procedure Code (HCFA 1500 forms, CPT code books, ICD.9 codes)
Medical Billing Software
Medical Billing Specialist Support
Diagnosis Code Directory

Finding the right EMR Online

Search engines are one of the most popular tools for finding the software you need, but finding the right EMR online presents its own challenges. For example, typing "EMR system" into any of the big three search engines will yield results similar to the following, which I looked up the day I posted this article: Google 566,000; Yahoo 547,000; MSN 242,835. This means that hundreds of thousands of indexed pages claim to have what you are looking for. So how do you sift through them all? Sometimes searches have to be narrowed by using the listed items above as a part of the search. Since medical practices and medical service providers need to control SOAP notes and medical transcription, use these terms to begin to narrow down the search.

EMR Benefits

An earlier article on EMR benefits lists characteristics of an EMR system that a medical practice or a medical service provider might enjoy with an EMR. In the Information Age of business, speed and efficiency are paramount to success. And when it comes to medical services, success is not only measured by a fiscal year but by a satisfied customer. An EMR system can make an office run smoothly, so that the customer always comes first.

Joe Miller is an online advertiser, specializing in medical software. More information on EMR and Medical Transcription, visit AdvanceMD.com.